Keeping It Real

And how else can we make rational decisions unless we know whats going on. Instead of the Mainstream media stringing us along with all that feel good feel bad news as if we were puppets. And it looks like government did do something about it. They got in on it. As there is no secret to the amount of influence media wields as they attempt to make or break our politicians as its extra, extra read all about it. Nothing democratic there just business as usual.

Fight for your mind. I doubt

Fight for your mind. I doubt there's much chance of stopping the corporate takeover of the internet and the end of net neutrality. The net is the greatest threat to elite rule and I believe they will take it down when push comes to shove.

One of the primary goals of elite control of the media is to prevent awareness of the money and banking scam. At the moment, the net has a wealth of information about it, the best being the zeitgeist movie and the money as debt movie. But in the corporate media it is kept completely off the radar screen. Even the CBC is willfully complicit. Anyone remember John Stachow? When he ran for the leadership of the Canadian Alliance on a platform of money reform, CBC radio's This Morning (Michael Enright and Ira Basen) edited his speech, ridiculing him and altering his message. This is how sinister things are in the corporate media. Fight for your mind. Good work, Tyee.

Preaching beyond the converted

Excellent idea of a column. Not sure however how to reach out or "preaching beyond the converted" readers.

Please do not forget the important Media Carta initiative from the Adbusters media fondation folks. It is most significant IMO and I remain amazed that their court case is getting absolutely no coverage whatsoever even in the non MSM press.

Quizz ...

OK, here's a quick personal quizz.

Just suppose you found out about something outrageous, illegal, and of immense importance to all citizens of B.C.

Suppose you had copies of official documents proving your point. Suppose you even had witnesses.

Suppose you were willing to take the story to the media so that the truth would be revealed and something done to stop the injustice?

Q. To whom in B.C. or all of Canada would you take your plain brown envelope?

mediacheck

Another example of how absolutely awful everything is when it is allowed to grow bigger and bigger without restraint.

When will we learn that bigger is not ever automatically "better?" No part of "the media" should be allowed to stifle competition by acquiring any other portion of it. Only by the publication of "the truth" by a separate source can the other sources of information be kept on the straight and narrow.

I hope this thread attracts as many Tyee readers as other subjects have. We need a loud voice that the CRTC and governments can hear.

An interesting 'take' on new media and the internet

From the Columbia Review of Journalism:

http://www.cjr.org/overload/interview_with_clay_shirky_par.php?page=all

Thanks Gwest, that was

Thanks Gwest, that was fascinating. It points to the incredible potential of the net, which is why many of us believe the elite will not let it continue much longer.

siamdave, I've been to your site before, not my style but good work nonetheless. I think most 'alt' sites are simply ignorant of the scam, but some sites seemingly refuse to touch it. The Tyee for example has very good commentary by say Dobbin and Mair, but only within the monetary box, even though it's been pointed out to them many times by various people. So there's a willful ignorance there, an unwillingness to "unlearn" the crap they've been fed all their lives. These are the intellectual gatekeepers that keep us stuck in fantasy.

By the way, it seems that

By the way, it seems that the zeitgeist movie is now the most watched movie in the history of the internet. Figures are not very accurate, but it looks like views are approaching 100 million.

http://www.zeitgeistmovie.com/

Truth, and sticking to it.

It makes me furious when the newspapers print a letter to the editor with the facts wrong. Like "the conservatives won the election" (you only "win" an election in a parliamentary democracy if you get more seats than the other parties combined).
Really straightforward!
People have the right to their opinions but I believe papers only have the right to print the truth.
So the only way they should be allowed to print that letter is with the correction noted below or above it.
We need some regulation to keep them honest.

Congrats Again, Tyee

Congratulations to the Tyee again for its ongoing courage in speaking out about what really matters. The current defecit in democratic media is horrendous. It will always take strength and courage to speak up about monopoly power, whether it be media concentration, bankng, oil or insurance. Oligarchs have learned to seek and retain power in most societies. Democracy has always been the antidote, which is why it is opposed. Great series and I'm looking forward to more.

I think this statement is wrong.

"Social change is propelled by open public discussion, and public discussion is suffocated by undemocratic media."

There are more and more forums opening up in MSM sites which are in essence forums for public discussion. I don't know of any physical forums where you can get 2 or 3 hundred people checking in almost instantly on a current topic.

The Tyee ( a wublication) is a mild example of how this occurs because the number of readers is relatively small compared to an MSM site. There are lots of others including blogs galore that all allow comments and most are not harshly culled for any particular agenda.

If somebody is not doing it already, the discussions that on go in these forums could be gathered and used as one of the sources of public opinion.

Not only that but solutions for various problems can be hashed over and only a fool would consider the source before the idea.

Most MSM is just coming on stream with their comments columns and this will allow for more public input.

The wheat still has to be separated from the chaff but there is potential for this to be a valuable tool.

Well snert.

If the conservatives had got more seats than all others combined they would have won the election. No question. Since they won more seats than any other party but did not get a majority to say that they "won" the election is not the complete truth. That begs the question, is a half-truth really the truth or is anything other than 100% truth a lie. I think Brian White has a point. Too much reporting is "distorting" the real truth by giving less than 100% truth. I would be content if the media only printed facts and let me form my own opinion from them. They won't do that because their whole purpose is manipulation toward a specific agenda. So they will print opinion even though the sometimes disguise it as fact. Facts are facts regardless of which way you look at them.

At least on the Tyee we may get distortion from some but there are enough people who see through this and point out the "lie" portion. That is a lot safer than the other media.

MSM Comment Boards

MSM Comment Boards are not representative of anything significant: Posters are anonymous, posting from unconfirmed locations and, for the most part indulging in 'conversation which rapidly disintegrates into squalls of 'writing' concerned largely with the figurative equivalent of screaming at each other and ignoring the matter of the article to which the comments are attached.

Take some time and sift through a two or three hundred long record at the Globe and Mail this weekend.

This stuff tells us little or nothing about what a representative sample of Canadians think about anything.

Polls are unreliable; interpreting the ratio of comment threads - particularly in this time of political manipulation - is even worse.

Skywalker's final paragraph seems far more prescient to me.

G West

Looks like you decided to don the cap all by yourself.

I made the comment that the wheat had to be separated from the chaff and also pointed out that there are other sources than just the MSM comment boards.

Oddly enough they all constitute public discussion unlike anything we have seen in the past.

You fear of anonymity lends one to think that you only read books if they have a suitable cover.

Certainly there are comments where the context of any anonymity must be taken into account. Just as certainly there are lots of errors and misconceptions but these forums can be used to expose them.

I have taken the time to pour through large numbers of posts and there are enough gems to warrant recognizing these comment boards as viable sources of public sentiment. That doesn't mean they should be the only source but I think you will find that they can be both a source of new ideas and of public opinion. That's my anonymous opinion.

Skywalker

Truth can be a many faceted diamond. That was my only point. If you look through it you don't always see what other see but that doesn't make them wrong.

snert

While I agree with you that the comment boards the MSM provides can reveal an estimation of public sentiment, for the most part they reflect only the predicable opinion of the readership that particular organ caters to.

To be sure, there are gems that appear, but IMO these few do not warrant the pain of wading through a few hundred repetitive and often ill-informed comments just to glimpse an occasional gem.

Far better, I think, to spend time with Tyee threads in which topics are thoroughly discussed, and from which one can learn something. Few posters here, I think, are willing to spend time carelessly putting forth ideas which they know will be torn to shreds by subsequent posters.

This is the result, I think, of the work of the moderators, who besides scuttling the obvious trolls, endeavor to keep the comments civil. Though I often disagree with Mr Beer's judgements, in the end I have to admit the result is that the level of discussion here far surpasses that of the usual blog.

A timely link?

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081222.wtorontoist20/BNStory/Technology/home

Smartness of the crowd

I think we have been conditioned to believe that people are stupid, greedy, self-serving, etc... And therefore not be trusted. Therefore we behave as such.

Something has to be said about the ability of crowd to decide the best course when facing a problem (e.g. media concentration). I think a book was written on this topic recently. A media that can harvest this smartness of the crowd would do a great public service IMO, even if disruptive to the current world order. Perhaps an MSM media could someday do it under some sort of regulatory framework. Citizen driven medias can raise the bar at this point. Don't think the regulatory framework will do it although will still advocate for one.

ME2

Maybe Rafe Mair would like to pop in and give us some idea of the effects that radio talk shows have on politics. These are forums for public discussion as well.

As far as MSM comment boards are concerned more and more, if not by now most, MSM web publications are jumping on board. There seems to be rising interest in this form of discussion.

You are absolutely right about the wading part but most public discussion is like that when a forum is open to such. It's not a pretty sight and I think that's why more people do not participate.

I get the feeling that some people are equating public discussion with some form of magical cure to what ails us.

G West is concerned about anonymity and location and the impact they may have on the value of any discussion that takes place. Well what's the difference when people are bussed into a community to try and sway a public discussion on a certain topic? For all intents and purposes they are anonymous to the locals.

Where comment boards could really shine is in the local community web publications but I don't see that happening just yet. FWIW I think the Tyee is a little too broad spectrum to fall into that category.

One problem that will probably persist is the tendency of some to react in a knee jerk fashion to contentious topics that need to be thoroughly worked through.

I disagree

MSM comment boards are, from my perusal of them, largely a multi-facted lump of coal.

Few posters appear to have even taken the time to read the original jouralism - not that such an approach is unfamiliar to Tyee Readers.

We're not talking about 'truth' here, however defined - we're talking about the lowest common denominator of uneducated 'opinion'.

It you're taking a lot of time poring over, for example, the Toronto Star or the Globe and Mail (200 - 500 comments on average) you're wasting your time.